Murder (novel) comes to town

Not exactly the things you want to hear from the mouth of an administrator at your local university but are the sort of things welcome when he puts fingers to computer keyboard to produce a page-turning political thriller.

Tom Ellis, assistant to the president at Washburn University, said the road to the publication of his first novel, "Candidate to Kill" (Writer's Showcase Press), began a few years ago when he decided to enter a "short" short story contest, in which the maximum length of the tale was 250 words.

Book signing

Tom Ellis will discuss and sign copies of his novel, "Candidate to Kill," from 6 to 8 p.m. today at Barnes & Noble, 6130 S.W. 17th. The book can be purchased there, at the Washburn University Bookstore, the Booktique in the Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library and through most major online booksellers.

"I did well in that contest, so I entered another one, and I did well in that contest, then I thought, 'Wouldn't it be fun to tell a story in more than 250 words,' " Ellis said.

Ellis, an alumnus of Washburn who left his job as manager of its Memorial Union in 1994 only to be rehired in 1997 as President Jerry B. Farley's assistant, decided to try his hand at a novel.

Ellis said he likes to read historical fiction, but the problem with writing that genre is that it requires considerable research. So Ellis chose a more contemporary political setting in Topeka and northeast Kansas for his book.

"You can do the research by reading the paper, and all the story ideas come off the front page," Ellis said.

During almost every election cycle, there is some unexpected transition in power where a candidate dies or resigns. Usually, those transitions are orderly.

"I wondered what would happen if it wasn't so orderly and well planned," said Ellis, referring to the plot of "Candidate to Kill," in which a Kansas congressman dies in a car accident four months before an election. State party officials turn to Joe Morgan, a young ambitious county prosecutor, to fill the lawmaker's unexpired term. However, the background check on Morgan doesn't reveal a dark episode from his college days.

When he began writing the book, Ellis said he knew its beginning and its end, as well as the main characters.

"But the journey between the beginning and the end was as much a surprise to me as it is to anybody else who reads the book," he said, with a chuckle.

"I didn't start out to write a murder mystery," Ellis continued. "It was just that circumstances were such that I'm going along and I go, 'Oh my gosh, this guy is gonna get killed,' and it was a surprise to me."

Getting "Candidate to Kill" into print proved frustrating as few publishers are willing to give a first-time author a chance.

"I spent a year writing this book and seven years trying to get somebody to read it," Ellis said. "I probably have a stack of rejection letters an inch thick from people who never read it."

The breakthrough for Ellis came with the development of publishing-on-demand technology where a book exists only in digital form until a copy is ordered.

Major booksellers then can crank out a copy to fill the order.

Ellis said reaction to the book has been nothing but favorable.

"Nobody that I know yet has predicted the end," he said. "I take that as a compliment."

And those who have started to read it couldn't put it down until they finished, said Ellis, who said that is exactly the kind of novel he likes to read.